BNP Paribas appoints new head of wealth management in Italy

PARIS (Reuters) - BNP Paribas <BNPP.PA>, France's biggest bank, on Friday named Elena Goitini as its head of private banking and wealth management in Italy, and added it was launching a new growth strategy for the unit.

Banks are looking for ways to diversify their business and sell more fee-based products in order to protect their profits from the impact of a negative interest rate environment.

BNP Paribas hired Goitini from Unicredit Group <CRDI.MI> where she held key roles in Italy and in Central Eastern Europe.

The French bank said it planned to hire more private bankers in Italy.

"To benefit from the expansion of the Italian market, where our assets under management have grown 60 percent between 2012 and 2019, we want to accelerate our growth ... across all regions - and in particular in the north of Italy," Sofia Merlo, Co-CEO of BNP Paribas Wealth Management said in a statement.

(Reporting by Maya Nikolaeva; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)